Making a Dragon Ball game, especially a competitive fighter, is incredibly difficult The show is known for extremely fast-paced, frantic action. When making a game it's extremely hard to stay faithful to that style of action while keeping the game playable and enjoyable.
Anyone who has played any of the games of the Guilty Gear and/or BlazBlue games were definitely intrigued when they heard Arc System Works was designing a Dragon Ball tournament fighting game. Those games featured anime-like characters with extremely fast-paced gameplay, so it sounded like a match made in heaven.
Fortunately for all of us, it was. This is probably the best balance possible for a game to properly represent the action of the Dragon Ball anime while remaining a competitive fighting game. The action is fast-paced, combo potential can go from the impressive to the insane (especially when players master the tag system), and the character attacks remain true to that character.
The story mode is interesting, to say the least. It tries to incorporate the player into the fights, as well as explain how all these characters are able to fight on the same level (normally, Yamcha wouldn't be able to touch Frieza, for example). The dialogue between the characters is also very well-written. It's clear the writing staff consisted of long-time fans of the series. There are various call-backs to lines from the original show ("Super Saiyan bargain sale,") as well as some clever twists on character history (Ginyu won't body change with Cell because Cell's green skin is too much like a frog's). My only complaint on the story mode is it is tedious. There are way too many pointless fights on every "board." If those were cut down or down with more variety it would have been much more enjoyable.
While it isn't perfect (no game is), this is probably the best Dragon Ball competitive fighting game that could ever be made.
Anyone who has played any of the games of the Guilty Gear and/or BlazBlue games were definitely intrigued when they heard Arc System Works was designing a Dragon Ball tournament fighting game. Those games featured anime-like characters with extremely fast-paced gameplay, so it sounded like a match made in heaven.
Fortunately for all of us, it was. This is probably the best balance possible for a game to properly represent the action of the Dragon Ball anime while remaining a competitive fighting game. The action is fast-paced, combo potential can go from the impressive to the insane (especially when players master the tag system), and the character attacks remain true to that character.
The story mode is interesting, to say the least. It tries to incorporate the player into the fights, as well as explain how all these characters are able to fight on the same level (normally, Yamcha wouldn't be able to touch Frieza, for example). The dialogue between the characters is also very well-written. It's clear the writing staff consisted of long-time fans of the series. There are various call-backs to lines from the original show ("Super Saiyan bargain sale,") as well as some clever twists on character history (Ginyu won't body change with Cell because Cell's green skin is too much like a frog's). My only complaint on the story mode is it is tedious. There are way too many pointless fights on every "board." If those were cut down or down with more variety it would have been much more enjoyable.
While it isn't perfect (no game is), this is probably the best Dragon Ball competitive fighting game that could ever be made.